OPINION: New Mexico's energy future cannot be sold to Blackstone

New Mexico stands at a crossroads for its energy future. In May 2025, Blackstone, a private equity firm, in partnership with Public Service Company of New Mexico, announced plans to acquire TXNM Energy, the parent company of the state’s largest utility provider. PNM has already petitioned the Public Regulatory Commission for possible approval of this $11.5 billion deal, with both companies confident it will close within a year.

As we shape a path toward climate leadership, New Mexicans should be deeply concerned about private equity taking over our power grid. Blackstone is not a savior but another contender in the state’s already monopolized and profit-driven energy system. To challenge this narrative — that we need private corporations from New York, to manage public goods — the New Mexico No False Solutions Coalition (NM NFS) is sending a delegation to New York Climate Week to call out the commodification of our lands, water, air and basic human rights.

Blackstone is no ordinary investor. With $1.21 trillion in assets, it already controls major sectors of our lives: housing, energy, transportation, technology and water/waste. The company brands itself as innovative and future-focused, but in reality, its business model fuels the housing crisis, rising costs of living and the climate crisis itself. Allowing Blackstone to control New Mexico’s largest utility would only deepen corporate overreach into the essentials of our daily lives.

This takeover also arrives against the backdrop of New Mexico’s push to diversify its economy, modernize the grid and create jobs in energy. Unfortunately, those efforts have often leaned on greenwashed “solutions”— hydrogen, carbon capture, nuclear and speculative water projects that fail to deliver meaningful benefits to communities. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s Strategic Water Supply Plan, for example, has been widely criticized for prioritizing water for data centers, artificial intelligence and hydrogen over every day New Mexicans. What’s marketed as economic growth increasingly looks like an open invitation for corporate takeover.

The question, then, is whether Blackstone can be trusted to protect the public interest? Its track record elsewhere says otherwise. In Ohio, its ventures into nuclear energy raised costs and sparked controversy. Its global portfolio is marred by labor abuses and investments that drive environmental harm. And when measured against the framework of a “Just Transition”— which prioritizes worker rights, safety, environmental justice and racial equity — Blackstone fails on every count.

If our utility is accountable not to ratepayers but to private equity shareholders, how can we expect it to safeguard energy democracy? How will it prioritize clean, affordable power for New Mexicans when profit margins take precedence? The danger is clear: Our essential services will be reduced to financial assets in the portfolios of billionaires.

As Climate Week approaches, NFS will join national calls to “Make Billionaires Pay” by addressing the possible takeover of our utilities by Blackstone. These are demands for justice, for an economy rooted in people and the planet, not corporate greed. We know what’s at stake. You can’t drink oil. You can’t survive in an unlivable climate. And, you shouldn’t have to rely on Wall Street investors to keep the lights on. We have a duty to stand with our communities and resist the corporate capture of our most basic human needs. The path to climate leadership is not paved by billionaires — it will be built by and for the people of New Mexico.